Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1887-04-21
A SUGGESTION.

Why should not Salt Lake City have
an elevated railway? There is no reason
why the suggestion embodied in the
above question should not be utilized.
Salt Lake City is amply able to build
and support an elevated railway. In
fact, the city demands the building of
such a road, as it demands everything
else in the line of enterprise and devel-
opment. The city has entered upon the
broad course of progress which is to
make her one of the greatest
cities of the American continent.
Her metropolitan destiny is already as
sured. and her citizens should neg
lect no opportunity. They should
leave no stone unturned that
can be used in the building
up of their city. An elevated railway is
not the expensive enterprise it was few
years ago. Invention and experiment
have assimilated and cheapened here, as
elsewhere, and in the construction of an
elevated railway hundreds of dollars only
are now required where formerly thous-
ands were demanded. The latest i'm
provement in elevated railways, both in
utility and cheapness is the "Enos
Electric System" Los Angeles, has
adopted this system, and within the next
six months the progressive Southern
Californian city will be traversed
and encircled by an electric elevated rail-
way, and can boast a railway which will
carry, with perfect comfort and safety,
fifty people per car at the rate of sixty
miles an hour, including stops. The
Enos system is not an experiment; it
has been fully tried and proved. There is
now full-sized and fully-equipped road
in operation at Green Point, New Jersey,
and this road gives the utmost satisfaction.
What Green Point, New Jersey, has done,
and what Los Angeles is about to do,
cannot be beyond the business grasp
and enterprise of Salt Lake City!
The opportunity should furnish
the incentive to our capitalists. From
the RaiIWay and Steamship Guide we
clip the appended description of the
coming Los Angeles elevated electric
railway and explanation of the workings
of the system:
The track will be constructed on a series
of half braces sprung from posts set
from 40 to 60 feet apart, each post capable
of sustaining a weight of seventy-nine tons
strain, while the maximum weight of q
loaded passenger Car will not exceed thir-
teen tons. There are two 30-pound steel
L rails, one to be used as a carrying rail and
the other as guide. The rails are spiked
to cross -braced truss above and below,
four feet apart. The dynamo, which serves
as motor and trucks, runs upon the upper
rail and is held in position and guided by
two wheels on either side of the head of the
lower and inverted rail, connected by pair
of curved hangers to which the car is
suspended and which brings the centre
of gravity Immediately under tracks and
centre of car. AS the wheels on
the trucks above are fanged on both
sides, and owing to the ingenious oonstruc-
of of the guide trucks below, derailment is
impossible, thereby permitting the great
speed attained by this system. The cars
being suspended fourteen feet above the
roadway, passengers escape the disagreabIe |
feature of surface roads; there is no dust or |
jolting and perfect immunity from danger |
of collisions, either with vehicles or OBJ |
structions on roads or streets. The |
electricity is conveyed along a heavy wire |
laid in the shoulder under the head of lower |
inverted rail and is taken up by the wheels |
OF the guide trucks. This arrangement pre-
vents the possibility of persons or animals,
or IN fact anything except the moter, COM
ing IN contact with the electric current and
thus overcoming the danger of serious ac-
cldents. The power which runs the cars
will also Light and, if necessary, heat them.
as well as supply enough electricity to light
cost of operating, exclusive of engineers
wages, will not exceed two dollars per car
per day."